In recent months, there has been an internet rush to capitalize on oil and gas business. New dot-com companies range from e-commerce of equipment and chemicals to energy portals.
As well as for new energy players, the internet has spurred opportunities for existing "bricks-and-mortar" companies. It has also indirectly formed new markets for pipeline companies. In particular, rights-of-way allow oil companies a unique way to participate in the internet revolution.
More bandwidth
Consumers are interested in faster internet connections these days, and fiber optics provide this bandwidth demand. To bury fiber, however, is expensive. Not all telecommunications carriers have the means to connect consumer locations with suppliers.
That is why companies that already own conduits to consumer locations have valuable assets. Enter oil and gas pipelines, electric utilities, railroads, and even city sewers. Owners of these assets can bring fiber to nontraditional customers.
In 1985, Williams Pipe Line Co., Tulsa, pioneered the placement of fiber optics in abandoned pipelines. The oil industry's involvement in laying fiber did not take off until recently, however, spurred by the popularity of the internet. Today, Williams's nationwide fiber network spans 25,000 miles.
In 1998, PF Telecom LLC, Washougal, Wash., and Koch Telecom Ventures Inc., Wichita, Kan., formed PF.Net LLC. The company constructs and markets a national fiber optics network using rights-of-way from some of Koch's 40,000 miles of oil pipelines. By 2001, PF.Net plans to have a coast-to-coast, 15,000 mile fiber network for voice, data, and video traffic.
Among other companies, Kinder Morgan Inc., Houston, and Columbia Energy Services, Herndon, Va., have also invested in extensive fiber networks along their pipelines' rights-of-way.
Installing cables
Private rights-of-way offered by pipelines are advantageous, because they lower the risk of fiber getting cut or damaged.
Although companies sometimes route conduit through pipelines that are no longer in use, most new conduit is run alongside existing pipelines. According to PF.Net, abandoned pipelines are most often used when difficult bores, such as that under a river bed or a bridge, make them cost-effective.
If the terrain is normal and less than seven conduits are required, PF.Net installs conduits via a trenchless method called a "plow." Plows drop 1.5-in. ID conduit into the ground behind a pyramid-like wedge that forges a path.
Once the conduit is in place, an air gun blows a piece of foam attached to a rope, from one end of the conduit to the other. The fiber then is tied to the rope and pulled though the conduit.
In the pipeline
And a neat new technology is in the pipeline and in the pipeline.
Nortel Networks Corp., Brampton, Ont., last February unveiled new technology, called Dataflo, that allows fiber optics to be installed into operational pipelines.
Its new technology uses a high-tech "parachute" and fluid flow to drag a rugged-coated fiber cable down a pipeline. The parachute's main function is to stabilize and guide the cable as it moves through the duct. The installation can be done quickly and with minimal environmental impact.
In oil and water-flow conditions, positive forces on the cable alone ensure that fluid-drag force, which is in the same direction as the product flow, overcomes friction. By increasing drag, the parachute also allows for gas pipeline installations-although for more-limited distances.
The success of this technology and others like it will create a different type of cyber revolution, a faster and larger movement of traditional oil and gas companies into telecommunications and networking businesses.